mixing heads, hearts and tails?

nomorepissenupmypay · Post by **nomorepissenupmypay** » Tue Jan 18, 2005 8:59 pm

ok it all stated when me and my friends were talking about how much we all spent on alcohol since just before christmass. i said fuck thats a fair bit of money, i shuld start making my own. and everyone said yeah why dont ya we'll help you drink it.
so i had a look at some still designs. and then went around the house looking for things to use. first i found a beer keg that somhow ended up in my backyard after a good nite at the pub. i cant really remember but i think we were trying to run on it like lumberjacks. that would explain all the grazez on my elbows. then i found a gas stove burner out of an old caravan that i kept for camping but never ended up using. then i found a long piece of copper warter pipe under my house. when i pulled it out my girlfriend looked at me with a very strange look on her face and said ben WHAT THE FUCK DID YOU JUST DO?!! it was just an old piece, it wasnt connected to anything. had an old bucket in the shed. the last thing i needed was.... well im wondering how long it will before my girlfriend starts asking about what happened to the lid off the frying pan.
then i realised shit thats everything i need. it was all coming together nicely, it was ment to be.
anyway now its made and ready to go. i was wondering why its so important that i know when to cut whilst im distilling. i was thinking about after saving the forshots to mix with my dirtbike fuel. (just an idea).
why cant i just collect the whole run in seperate 500ml containers and line them up first to last then pick the one i like best. then try to mix some of the tails and or heads with the rest of the hearts to get it all the same as the first one i liked best while keeping it as reference. i havnt read anything about anyone doing that.
thanks

Guest · Post by **Guest** » Tue Jan 18, 2005 9:08 pm

i really dont bother with the cuts. i keep the heads,heart, and then the tails until the proof starts to get really low(5%). people say it dangerous but im still here.

Post by **Uncle Jesse** » Tue Jan 18, 2005 10:26 pm

I wouldn't take one that low, too many nasty fusels and cogeners.

Toss your first 250 ml, then start tasting. You don't even need to measure, just learn to do it by taste. Take a few drops of your distillate into a spoon as it exits your worm. Mix it with an equal amount of filtered water and then sip it. At first you'll taste the heads, the bad taste/aftertaste is unmistakeable. Soon they will start to fade and the taste will be sweeter. Collect until you get off flavors again. After that, stop collecting your drinking spirits but keep distilling for a while and save the tails, then throw them back into your next batch of whisky.

nomorepissenupmypay · Post by **nomorepissenupmypay** » Wed Jan 19, 2005 2:59 am

ok but the heads fade out and the tails fade in progressivly dont they? so the best flavour would be at one point in there somwhere. for egsample if i had the whole run in say 20 containers lined up, and the best tasting one was about the 13th. would it be reasonable to say that i could mix the rest of the heart together and add a little of the 14th or 15th container to it until it tastes the same as the 13th?

Post by **Fourway** » Wed Jan 19, 2005 7:35 am

nomorepissenupmypay wrote:ok but the heads fade out and the tails fade in progressivly dont they? so the best flavour would be at one point in there somwhere. for egsample if i had the whole run in say 20 containers lined up, and the best tasting one was about the 13th. would it be reasonable to say that i could mix the rest of the heart together and add a little of the 14th or 15th container to it until it tastes the same as the 13th?

That's the idea.

and you can monkey around with the flavor profile by changing that proportion.

Guest · Post by **Guest** » Wed Jan 19, 2005 9:27 am

Experiment with your own products, as long as you are sure to eliminate the foreshots first.

I usually collect until the product that is coming out of the still drops below 80 proof, anything that comes out after that is recycled as tails.

use your own personal preference.

nomorepissenupmypay · Post by **nomorepissenupmypay** » Wed Jan 19, 2005 2:07 pm

thanks i just wanted to know if i can do that without any side effects or problems. because im planning to fork out a fair bit of money for chared oak casks for ageing. i plan on making a bourbon and i dont want to go to all that trouble buy a heap of casks and wait 6 to 8 years only to find out the final product is shit. im going to make heaps for ageing. and just make all sorts of other drinks to to drink in the meantime.
thanks for helping out.

Mtn-Hi · Post by **Mtn-Hi** » Thu Jan 20, 2005 4:50 am

nomore,
You might try some small batches and see how it works. You can get a nice set of barrels from 1000oaksbarrel.com, I got a few of the five litre barrels that work great, for a pretty reasonable price. Also, if your product isn't coming out of your still tasting good then no amount of aging will change that. I'm a newbie too so that may or maynot be true. ?? So you should have a pretty good idea of what will come out of the barrel by what you put in it. Lastly, good luck on leaving your hooch in a barrel for 6 year or more!!

I'd be glad if I could stay out of it for 6 months!

Guest · Post by **Guest** » Thu Jan 20, 2005 5:47 am

Mtn-Hi wrote:nomore,
You might try some small batches and see how it works. You can get a nice set of barrels from 1000oaksbarrel.com, I got a few of the five litre barrels that work great, for a pretty reasonable price. Also, if your product isn't coming out of your still tasting good then no amount of aging will change that. I'm a newbie too so that may or maynot be true. ?? So you should have a pretty good idea of what will come out of the barrel by what you put in it. Lastly, good luck on leaving your hooch in a barrel for 6 year or more!! I'd be glad if I could stay out of it for 6 months!

I have a hard time with 3 months

Home Distiller

mixing heads, hearts and tails?

mixing heads, hearts and tails?

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